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Outlook "Stuck on top/Foreground". Issue is intermittent, and occurs usually after ~1 hour of use. Can be sooner

Hi.

I have been having ongoing issues with Outlook for over 6 months, in which Outlook will become locked to the foreground.

Outlook has no add-ins enabled, and has been repaired, reinstalled, updated and downgraded many times.

The affected OS is a Windows Server 2016, functioning as a terminal server.

The affected users have two screens, and occasionally when a window is dragged to the same screen area as Outlook, Outlook will remain the foreground focus and the application being dragged will be "under/behind" the Outlook window.

This can also happen when the user is using a single screen.

This is not application specific, and even happens with the Outlook "New Email" window if popped-out from the Outlook client.

We have gathered numerous ETL logs and event logs and have come up with absolutely nothing.

Previously, the only known way to resolve the matter was to close and re-open Outlook.

However, strangely enough I have found that opening the options menu and closing it (Not changing any options, hitting either cancel or OK) will also resolve the issue.

From the options menu, we have tried with the following settings both enabled and disabled, with no luck on any setting:

  • Hardware Graphics Acceleration
  • Live Preview
  • Use Animations when expanding conversations and groups

We have tested the Email auto-configuration XML, and the MS partner support rep I was working with has confirmed that it is all okay.

I also provided him with screenshots of the connection status when Outlook is stuck, and we confirmed that all was OK there.

Another potential solution that was tried was unlocking and locking the taskbar. Both when the issue occurs and pro-actively.

We also recreated one of the users Outlook profile. This did not resolve the issue.

The issue is confirmed to not follow the user to other devices.

I'm sure there are more solutions that we have tried, that I have simply forgotten about during the length of this ticket.

At long last, the technician had advised me that I need to rebuild the affected server. This is not an option for us, as the server is used literally every single day inclusive of weekends, and the customer is entirely dependent on the running of this server.

I have now been advised by the technician to log a forum post here.

Please let me know if any other information should be required, but I feel this is quite extensive.

I do have recordings of the issue, and all ETL + Event logs.

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Hello Nicholas Aldridge (NA),

 

Have a good day. Thanks for your post in forum.

 

Regarding your description, kindly try to fix the issue of Outlook with using Service and Recovery Assistant tool and check the issue. Following are the steps for fixing the issue of Outlook.

 

Download and start Support and Recovery Assistant

 

1.       Go to the Support and Recovery Assistant for Office 365 download page.

2.       Click Download now.

3.       Run the installation program.

4.       After installation, Support and Recovery Assistant will start automatically.

 

Use Support and Recovery Assistant

 

1.       Choose I agree to accept the license agreement.

2.       Select the app you want to get help with, and choose Next.

3.       Select the support topic that best describes your issue, and then choose Next.

4.       Sign in with your work or school account.

5.       Wait for the series of tests to finish.

6.       Review the test results, and do one of the following.

·         If the application succeeds in fixing your problem, follow the prompts and close the tool.

·         If the tests fail, the application will let you know the reason and suggest other solutions.

 

If the issue still persist, I need to collect below information from you.

 1.       Kindly provide us your detailed screenshot of your Office and Outlook desktop client version. For knowing Office and  outlook version https://support.office.com/en-us/article/what-version-of-outlook-do-i-have-b3a9568c-edb5-42b9-9825-d48d82b2257c

2.       Does other office application have the same problem?

 

 

 Hopefully above information will help you.

Regards,

Darpan

* Beware of Scammers posting fake Support Numbers here.

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Hello Nicholas Aldridge (NA),

If you need any other information or help, please feel free to contact us.

Regards,

Darpan

* Beware of Scammers posting fake Support Numbers here.

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Hi Darpan,

Thanks for your reply.

Unfortunately, SARA Is not really of much help, as the issue isn't one of the officially recognized scenarios in the application.

Please see below screenshots of my Outlook and office version.

(Below From Outlook application)

(Below from Control Panel)

No other MS Office applications are facing the same issue.

Thanks,

Nick

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Hello Nicholas Aldridge (NA),

Thank you for your reply in our forum.

1.  Regarding this issue, kindly try to open Outlook in safe mode. For opening outlook in safe mode > press Windows +R key and Type outlook.exe /safe.

   Note: There is a space between outlook and /safe.

2.  If the issue still persist, kindly try to uninstall the graphic card driver and re-install graphic driver and check the result about the issue.

On the other hand, if the issue still persist, for further analysis I need to collect below things from your side via private message.

1.       Video recording of this issue via private message.

2.       All ETL + Event logs via private message.

For your privacy, we will send you private message for collecting above information. Kindly provide us above information via this private message link: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/privatemessage/inbox

Regards,

Darpan

* Beware of Scammers posting fake Support Numbers here.

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Hey Darpan,

Thanks for your reply.

Unfortunately as the issue is intermittent, it's hard to tell if it's happening with Safe Mode.

I can't suggest the users to work in Safe Mode because they will lose their autocomplete list, but I've left a test user with Outlook open in safe mode and the issue hasn't occurred as of yet.

I'd be hesitant to say for sure if the issue occurs or not in Safe Mode because Outlook has simply been idling, not being used at all.

I've updated the graphics card driver from Device Manager, and it has said it is already running the best version. This machine is running on an Azure VM, so I can't install any graphics card drivers direct from the manufacturer's site.

I will provide to you the video recordings, ETL files and event logs in a PM to you now.

Thanks,

Nick

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It's been 2 and a half weeks. I was really hoping MS would come back with something actionable that would potentially address the issue. Same thing is happening with at least one of our RDS servers running Windows 2016 and Outlook 2019 (so I doubt it's an Azure issue). I'm probably missing half of the incidents since most people will simply restart Outlook.

I'm still documenting these incidents and I'm curious if it begins to happen on our second RDS server or if it's restricted to happening on just one of the servers. Again, I'll follow this thread, hopefully something "real" comes along to fix the problem.

Regards,

Donnie

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Yeah I highly doubt it's an Azure issue, but out of curiosity, which build of Windows Server 2016 are you running Donnie?

This could possibly be an issue with Outlook running on Windows Server 2016 issue, here's our server's build info:

I'd really like to put the customer on Server 2019, but unfortunately there's no real easy option for upgrading on Azure VMs

And secondly, are you running Outlook 32 or 64Bit? 

I'd be curious to see if there's still issues with 64Bit, but unfortunately I'm constrained by 32-bit plugins.

Lastly, is this happening for multiple users in your environment?

We've had other users scarcely experiencing the issue, but one user is experiencing it almost on a daily basis.

Thanks,

Nick

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We're running 2016 Standard, Version 1607 and build 14393.3242

It's a 64-bit installation of Outlook 2019. And yes, it's happening to multiple users. Actually, it was happening to 1 person for a couple of weeks and I thought it may have something to do with their individual profile ... but then a second user contacted me with the problem. That's when I started investigating and realized others had seen the same behavior. It is very inconsistent and again, I suspect others may have seen the problem ... but the workaround is to restart Outlook (which takes less time than putting in a support ticket).

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Hey DRChance,

Just out of curiosity, do you have the application ClickYesPro running on the affected server?

If it's not a concern for you, would you mind sharing a screencap(s) of installed programs on the affected server?

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We do not have ClickYesPro running on our servers. Below is a list of applications currently installed. For what it's worth … I haven't had any recent reports of the "stuck foreground" but that could be that people have gotten used to restarting Outlook.

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Last updated May 7, 2024 Views 32,088 Applies to: